


Misunderstandings and Missing something

by TomatoFujoshi



Category: Cabin Pressure
Genre: Alcohol Abuse/Alcoholism, BDSM, BDSM AU, D/s AU, Dom!Martin, M/M, Past Alcohol Abuse/Alcoholism, Sublas, struggle with relapse, sub!Douglas
Language: English
Status: In-Progress
Published: 2016-02-14
Updated: 2016-02-17
Packaged: 2018-05-20 13:47:27
Rating: Mature
Warnings: Creator Chose Not To Use Archive Warnings
Chapters: 4
Words: 6,977
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/6009096
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/TomatoFujoshi/pseuds/TomatoFujoshi
Summary: <blockquote class="userstuff">
              <p>Douglas struggles after his divorce.</p><p>Martin is there to help.</p><p>(Sorry for the bad summary, I don't want to spoil the plot... Heed the tags though)</p>
            </blockquote>





	1. Chapter 1.1: The past

**Author's Note:**

  * For [doorwaytoparadise](https://archiveofourown.org/users/doorwaytoparadise/gifts), [Linguini](https://archiveofourown.org/users/Linguini/gifts).



> Happy Porculoon day!!

Douglas was forever grateful for the law that stopped employers from asking about their employees designation prior to employing them.   
He was even more grateful for the anti-discrimination laws that forbade anyone to separate people on their designation for checks and just about everything else. 

He hated that these laws had only been in place for the last 10 years, so everyone at Air England had known about him and had treated him differently.   
He might have been a captain there, but to him it had seemed like it was only in name. Like he had gotten the promotion because the higher ups couldn’t deny it to him any longer.

At MJN no one ever needed to know. 

He had worked around enough Doms to be able to imitate them without any problems and with such a small charter airline it was unlikely he would encounter his former colleagues. It helped that domming people in a professional context had been frowned upon even before it became forbidden by law. 

Douglas had no idea if Carolyn ever found out about him not being what he pretended to be in the 8 years they had been working together.   
The string of captains that used their position at MJN to tide over to a better job certainly never knew. 

So when Martin came to work at MJN, Douglas’ first impression of him was that he was clearly trying too hard to assert his dominance to be anything other than a sub, just like him. 

As they continued to work together Douglas’ believe was just strengthened.  
Martin to backed down when Douglas used his expertise easily. In other situations he insisted on his point of view but Douglas could never even hear a slip of dominance from him. 

Sure it would have been unprofessional and on the brink of illegal for him to assert dominance, but it wasn’t unusual for people to slip up under stress.

He never asked, to confirm what he was sure was the truth, but neither did Martin. 

As long as he kept his work and private life separate his colleagues would never know. 

 

_________________________

 

Martin had always been quiet and withdrawn, presenting as a Dom, against what everyone thought, when he was 13 did nothing to change this.   
There was no way anyone would want him as a Dom, so why bother, becoming a pilot was much more important anyways. 

Over the years Martin learnt more about his place in the hierarchy of dominance, but it wasn’t often that he let that side of him be seen.   
He had been always taught to never let his designation get in the way of his education, work and life.

By the time he started working at MJN he hadn’t used his dominance outside of dating for years.   
It was like it was a whole separate self. It never occurred to him to try and use his dominance in fights with Douglas, it just wasn’t done.   
He knew he wasn’t a low level dominant, but who knew where Douglas was on the scale and losing a fight that way would be worse than simply losing.


	2. Chapter 1.2: and the present

If Martin thought Douglas was insufferable before, it had been nothing compared to the way he acted after his divorce had been finalised.   
Before Douglas had simply been a smug git but now he snapped at nearly everyone, Arthur seemed to be the only exception to the rule.  
Martin had been at the end of more snide comments on one flight than in his whole first month at MJN. 

Douglas seemed to be unable to control his outbursts, often apologising right after, still there was never an ounce of dominance in there.   
It left Martin to wonder how Douglas was able to reign in his dominance better than him, while unable to control his temper.   
Or had his assessment been wrong? 

 

Martin took another deep breath before he left the tiny loo to rejoin Douglas in the flight deck.   
Maybe it had been cowardly of him to flee instead of facing Douglas’ current mood, but he had felt his control slip and starting some kind of stand-off not even half way to their destination could end pretty bad. 

“Sorry about earlier”  
“It’s alright” He wanted to help Douglas, he just didn’t know how to ask without his offer being ill-received. Martin knew Douglas wouldn’t talk about it on his own, but he also clearly couldn’t deal with it himself.   
“No it’s not” Douglas sighed.  
“It really is. While I think it would be better if you found another way to deal with things than snap at all of us, it’s still alright. Breakups are always hard.”  
Douglas mumbled something. Martin couldn’t understand what was said but he caught the general gist of the emotion conveyed.  
“Maybe you should go out. Meet a nice stewardess or something?”  
“Weren’t you pretty much against the idea of random pickups the last time we talked about it”  
“I don’t have to like it, I want to help you”  
“Don’t” Douglas said turning to stare straight ahead. Martin barely heard what Douglas said after that, just above a whisper he said “Won’t help”

They spend the rest of the flight in silence.   
Martin was grateful for the break from Douglas snapping at him, but he also wished he knew how to help. 

_____________________

 

Hours later they arrived at the hotel Carolyn had chosen for them this time.   
It was, once again, some tiny back-alley hotel in the worst part of the city.   
Martin hoped it would offer at least enough comfort for him to get some sleep, he really needed the rest before they flew back home the next morning.

“What do you mean only one room?” Martin heard Douglas saying to the clerk, pulling him out of his thoughts.   
“I’m sorry sir. The reservation under your company’s name is only for one room, 2 beds.”  
“Can we get another room?”  
“No, everything else is booked”  
Douglas sighed and turned back to Martin, who just shrugged. 

He didn’t want to share a room with Douglas after today, but it wasn’t the worst that could happen.

 

Martin went to get ready for bed right after they had gotten to their room.

When he came out of the bathroom Martin saw Douglas standing in the middle of the tiny room holding what looked like one of the miniatures of Talisker from Birling day.   
If Douglas knew Martin was back in the room he didn’t show it. 

Martin stayed where he was, curious what Douglas would do and why he had one of the bottles with him on this trip.

Douglas looked through the bottle against the light. Just staring at it. 

When Martin saw Douglas opening the bottle he couldn’t just stand there any longer. 

“Douglas” Martin exclaimed, dominance unconsciously bleeding into his voice.  
Douglas turned around, stunned, hands dropping to his sides. The sound of the bottle hitting the floor loud in the resulting silence, still it rolled away unnoticed by either man.  
“Sorry” Martin said turning away not daring to look at Douglas now, fearing he would shoot back.   
“It’s okay” Douglas said, voice hoarse “Thank you for stopping me”

No smart comments from Douglas? And an outright thank you on top of that?? 

“Have you drunken anything before I came out of the bathroom?” Martin turning back. He needed to see if Douglas was telling the truth.  
“No.”  
“Okay… Good…” Martin wasn’t fully sure if he could believe Douglas, but it didn’t seem to be a flat out lie. It was good enough for now.

Before anything more could be said Douglas went into the bathroom and Martin got into his bed.

 

___________________

 

“So you are a Dom?” Douglas asked softly some time after they had turned off the lights, afraid to wake Martin if he was asleep already.   
“You didn’t know before?” Martin answered promptly.  
“I didn’t want to assume anything, but my guess never was that you are a Dom, no. Maybe a Switch, but not a Dom”  
“Am I so bad of a Dom, that you wouldn’t even see me as one?”  
“How should I have known. You didn’t let on much of it”  
“Most Doms still know after a few minutes of talking. We have been working together for years” Martin said his voice sounding as if he was pouting.  
At that Douglas couldn’t stop the laughter bubbling up in him.   
“What’s so funny?”  
“Well let’s just say me not realising you are a Dom is not the only misunderstanding about our designation that we have had.”  
“You AREN’T a Dom?!”  
“Well guessed, Sir.”  
“How?”  
“I think this is covered in middle school biology classes. Even you should know”  
“I do know that. I meant, how can you be a sub with all of your. Everything.” Martin said, Douglas could hear the gestures he made with the last word “Or are you a switch?”   
“No, I’m not. I’m just a bossy sub with acting skills, I’m afraid. Good to know that Doms don’t find me out unwanted though”   
“Why don’t you want others to know?”  
“Most Doms hate Subs being in positions of responsibility. They think we bend over at the first hint of a command”  
“I thought there were only a very few who still thought like that”  
“Few have the guts voice their opinion openly, but I lost count of how often it has been said to my face when they knew about me. And there were many more situations where people made the same mistake you did and talked to me in some dive bar about how ridiculous sub rights are.”  
“It’s so stupid. Why do people even still think like that?”  
“Been raised liberal then, dear Captain?”  
“My parents never made any difference between us children. And well look at me, to say my family was surprised when it turned out I’m a Dom is an understatement.”  
“Where does all that self control come from then? I have never seen you dom your way into anything.”  
“It’s against the rules” Martin said as if it was the most important thing. More quietly he added “And it feels like cheating if you get your wish through commands”  
Douglas couldn’t help but laugh at that “Martin. You are possibly the first Captain I met who is against getting his will that way”  
“You were a Captain too weren’t you?”  
“Yes. And I would have loved to be able to get a word in, when those upstart Dom pilots tried domming me to get control”  
“But that’s against the law”  
“My bosses didn’t care. And how should I have proven it to any one?” Douglas said resigned “Nothing I can do about it now. It’s been 10 years. So how come you never came into contact with these people?”  
“I kept to myself most of the time, trying to become a pilot. People never really liked me and going out to pick up someone felt like a waste of time when I could use that time for studying. Especially after I failed the first few times.” Martin said thoughtfully “It’s not like subs throw themselves at me. I don’t make much of a Dom most of the time.”  
“Ah.”  
“My family thought I was a sub until I accidentally dommed one of my bullies. Turned out he had presented as a sub just days before and naturally hadn’t told anyone. It was quite a shock to see him on his knees before me suddenly”  
“I can imagine. It still doesn’t really explain how you are able to control yourself so well. There were fights between us where professionalism doesn’t explain your level of control”  
“My dad always told Simon, and later me too, to never use your designation to get ahead of others, me and Caitlyn got told not to let others tell us we couldn’t have something because of it. I think I never saw my dad domming my mum when it wasn’t needed. I took all the required classes and everything but It was never a thing I used in my day to day life. It just happened.”  
“Ah. You are pretty much the first Dom I met who is this casual with his Dominance”

The conversation tapered off after that both pilots needing to sleep, but also needing the time to come to terms with the things that had been revealed.


	3. Scene one

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> This chapter is brought to you by Linguini being lovely and Beta reading it for me :D

The flight back the next day was tense, neither pilot dared to start another conversation about yesterday’s revelations.

 

Martin wondered if they should discuss what this would mean for their work or if that would be the wrong course of action and he should just act as if nothing happened.

 

Douglas tried to act like before, but some part of him kept telling him that things would change now that Martin knew. That it would become as bad as it had been at Air England.

 

Both pilots also thought about what it meant for their private life.

Douglas had been wanting a new partner for a while now, but he wanted trust them instead of just searching casual encounters.

Martin had been intrigued by his First Officer for a while now but never thought much about it. Two Doms in a relationship were very rare after all and often frowned upon on top of that.

_________________

Douglas had long gone home, while Martin was still working on the post-flight paperwork, when Arthur came out of Carolyn’s office.

 

“Skip, did you have a fight with Douglas?”

“No why do you ask?” Martin said looking up from his work.

“You didn’t talk this morning. At all. And then there were also no games on the intercom even though there were no passengers.”

“It’s nothing Arthur.”

“But why didn’t you talk then? You always talk. Even when you disagree.” Martin wanted to interject that they did talk. Talking was necessary when flying a plane after all, but before he could answer Arthur continued “No Skip. The checks don’t count as talking”

When had Arthur become this observant?

“It’s really nothing. Things will be back to normal by the next trip.” Martin really hoped so. He didn’t want Arthur meddling in this. A few days not spent in Douglas’ immediate presence should give him enough time to work through things and get himself back under control.

 

_________________

 

Martin was woken up by his phone late the following night. He had gone to bed early after a particularly hard van job. Still half asleep, he grabbed for his phone, hoping this wasn’t a prank call or a client thinking he was entitled to call in the middle of the night. But that would only leave an emergency.

 

Oh god.

 

That thought woke Martin up completely and he didn’t even take the time to check the caller ID before picking up. Who knew how long the phone had been ringing before it had woken him.

 

“Martin Crieff.”

 

“Martin.” What?

 

“Douglas?”

 

“Sorry did I wake you?”

 

“Ye… No. What’s up?” Why was Douglas calling him in the middle of the night? Martin looked at the glowing numbers on his alarm clock, to see if it was as late as he thought it was. 12:19am. It wasn’t too late but still too late to just call a colleague.

 

“Um… If it isn’t too much of a bother could you come over?”

 

“Why? What happened? Do you need anything?”

 

“I just thought hanging out would be nice.” Why would Douglas call him just to ask him to hang out? After midnight, no less. Something must be up that Douglas wasn’t telling him. Or couldn’t he tell Martin? Knowing that Douglas was a sub made Martin’s protective instincts much stronger, even if the other man was older and bigger than him.

 

“Sure. I’ll be there soon.” Martin said already mentally planning the best route to Douglas’ house and standing up to find clean clothes.

 

“Thank you,” Douglas said before hanging up. Martin stared at his phone for a second before rushing to get dressed. Pulling on his jeans over his pyjama pants, putting his wallet and keys into his pockets and grabbing the first sweater he could find pulling it on he went downstairs as fast as he could without waking the whole house.

 

__________________

 

Douglas had spent his day off avoiding his empty house as much as he could. He sat in a cafe for hours nursing a few cups of coffee. He went to the bank to get done with some boring ‘What can we do for you? Can we sell you this?’ meeting he had been putting off for ages. He also spent a long time staring at the adverts in the windows of estate agents, thinking about moving out of the now way too big house and moving into a smaller one, maybe just a flat.

But as afternoon became evening he went home before he got tempted to a bar or pub.

 

Sitting in his living room seemed to make things worse. So many things reminded him of Helena. It was too big and it was still closing in on him.

 

Douglas lost track of time and when he came back to the present he was sitting in the kitchen opposite a bottle of Talisker. He glanced in the direction he knew his sobriety chips were. Usually that stopped the urge to open a bottle but today it did almost nothing, it only reminded him of his failings.

 

He cursed himself for keeping alcohol in the house.

 

He had just enough self control left to know he should talk to someone. Find someone to talk him down. Maybe even help him get out of this slump. But who could he talk to? He didn’t have many friends outside of work, he had left his old friends behind when he quit drinking and most of the other people he considered friends had really been his wives’ friends.

The people who knew he is a sub would just laugh in his face and tell him he deserved it.

 

Then he remembered Martin. Martin knew now. Could he call Martin? Burden him with his problems?

 

Douglas tried to think of any other person he could call. But there was no one and now that the idea of calling Martin was in his head it didn’t let him think about any other possibilities.

 

It would be his only chance.

______________________

When Martin arrived at Douglas’ house he almost ran the short way from his van to Douglas’ door. He had half worked himself into a panic thinking about what could have happened to Douglas to make him call Martin.

 

Was he hurt?

If yes how bad?

 

Martin rang the doorbell and instead of the footsteps he anticipated to hear, he heard what sounded like someone moving away from the door after leaning against it.

He didn’t have time to dwell on what it could mean because only seconds later the door opened to reveal Douglas standing in the dark hall, looking worse than Martin had ever seen him.

 

“What happened?”

 

“Later.” Douglas said “Kitchen, please.”

 

“What? Kitchen?” Martin said, confused by Douglas’ pleading tone.

 

“You’ll see”

 

Martin almost wanted to sigh at the commands he was given but the urgency in Douglas’ voice stopped him. He walked towards the kitchen Douglas following him at some distance.

 

The kitchen seemed to be the only room in the house where the light was actually turned on and there right under the lamp over the kitchen table stood a bottle of Talisker.

 

“Oh Douglas” Martin whispered, walking over to it. He was relieved when the seal appeared to be still unbroken.

 

Martin picked it up and he went straight to the sink with it. He could feel Douglas watching his every move from the doorway, but there was no protest when Martin poured the whole bottle down the drain. He let the bottle fall into the sink when it was empty, turning on the tap to wash away anything that hadn’t gone straight down the drain.

 

After turning off the tap, Martin turned around leaning against the counter “Are you going to talk now?”

 

“I think you can guess.”

 

“All I know is that I have seen you with actual alcoholic drinks twice in the last 3 days. That isn’t much to go on. And while I am grateful that you called me I still want to know what is going on, so there won’t be a third time!”

 

“I’m a sub. Weak willed and so on.” Douglas said, shrugging as if that would explain everything.

 

“No, Douglas, you are not. Sit down and talk. You wouldn’t have called me if you didn’t think I could help. You could have called anyone to get them to pour the bottle down the drain or done it yourself”

 

Douglas finally moved into the kitchen and collapsed on the closest chair. Martin pushed away from the counter to join Douglas at the table.

__________________

Douglas sat down, collecting his thoughts now that the temptation was finally gone.

Something in him protested sitting at the same level as Martin, wanted him to slide down to the floor and kneel in front of Martin.

 

Where had that thought come from?

 

Martin was waiting for him to start talking, staring at him expectantly.

 

Where to start?

 

“Things haven’t been good after Helena left. This is pretty much the longest time I’ve gone without a Dom. I haven’t really been lying with saying I’m a needy sub. Things can get pretty intense if there’s no one to quiet my head.”

 

“And the alcohol can quiet your head?”

 

“If I drink enough to pass out.”

 

“Ah. Thank you for calling me.” Martin said sincerely, it gave Douglas a bit more confidence in what he wanted to ask of Martin. There was still quite a big chance he would be rejected, but the fact that he was still here, calmly sitting with him gave him hope.

 

“Thank you for coming. I am afraid there is more to this ambush than needing help pouring the bottle”

 

“You need me to quiet your head? Whatever that means.”

 

“Yes.” Douglas didn’t think Martin would understand so quickly

 

“How can I do that?” Martin asked, casually taking the lead of the conversation, for which Douglas was grateful.

 

“You don’t have to if you don’t want to but you were the only person I could think of. I can find someone else…” Douglas rambled on.

 

“Douglas!” Martin said, there was no dominance in his voice, but there was enough of a hint of it to make Douglas stop “Is it because I am a Dom and know about you?”

 

“Yes.” Douglas looked away from Martin, looking down at his fingers which were nervously moving around, gripping each other or just air.

 

“So what do you need me to do?”

 

How was Martin still calmly sitting there?

Douglas had basically admitted to needing him to Dom him, something Martin had said he wouldn’t usually do just two days ago.

But right now Martin was sitting there, all confidence, an air of leadership around him that was almost never there while they were working.

 

Douglas was pretty sure Martin knew what needed to be done, but still wanted Douglas’ verbal confirmation and consent.

Why was it so hard to say those words.

 

Douglas took a deep breath rushing the words on the exhale “I need you to Dom me.”

 

“How?”

 

“I’m sure even you know how Domming works,” Douglas snapped. Why couldn’t Martin just get on with it?

 

“Douglas.” This time there was a true command in it, but Martin continued without it “I should have worded that better, in what way do you want to be dommed?”

 

“At this point I don’t really care. Preferably I should be fully under by the end of it,” Douglas shrugged, he was still tense, but some of the tension had drained out of him when it became clearer that Martin would be helping him.

 

“I will make this short then” Martin said something starting to shift in him “We need to discuss this further if you still need me afterwards but I will stick to the short version for now. Safeword?”

 

“Bristol”

 

“Ok. Your safeword is Bristol.” If he was amused by the choice of word Martin didn’t let it on “Any limits you want to tell me now? Or should we stick to the traffic lights for that for now?”

 

“Nothing with blood.”

 

“No blood, understood. If anything else comes up the lights stand.” Martin stood up, the shift in him locking into place. Suddenly he seemed taller, less scrawny.

 

“Let’s take this somewhere more comfortable then,” Martin said, his voice having dropped an octave. “Living room,” he commanded.

 

Douglas had seen the shift happening but was still surprised by it. The urge to drop down to the floor in front of Martin returning full force. Did Martin want him to walk to the living room or should he give into his urges and crawl?

 

Martin seemed to see his struggle “Walk.”

 

Douglas stood up slowly, supporting himself with his hands on the table, unsure if his legs could hold him up. When he was sure they would he started walking Martin was silent for the length of the short walk, but he was close behind Douglas the whole time, a hand resting on the small of his back, not pushing. It was just there.The gesture felt equal parts reassuring and possessive, and Douglas’ knees threatened to give out once again.

 

In the living room, when they were both standing on the soft rug in front of the sofa, Martin walked around Douglas to face him.

“On your knees. Hands behind your back”

 

Douglas barely registered Martin’s surprise when he just dropped to the floor, his knees giving in, mind eager to follow the command.

 

Martin’s hand landed on his head, not grabbing or pulling just slowly stroking to his hair “This isn’t going to take much, is it?”

 

Douglas didn’t know if he was supposed to answer the question. Martin hadn’t even told him how he wanted to be addressed.

 

Martin may have been talking about being bad Dom, but just in the few minutes Douglas had seen what was under the shell of the insecure pilot, he had seen just how confident Martin could be, what power lay in him. Martin didn’t need cruelty to show he was in command.

 

Douglas couldn’t remember ever being brought to this point by just words and a few small gestures. There was nothing keeping him in place and he still felt secure, wrapped up tight.

 

He felt the need to say something, anything. To answer the question? To thank Martin? He didn’t know.

 

He slowly, carefully looked up into Martin’s face, seeing him smile down at him.

 

When Douglas opened his mouth to speak, Martin spoke first “Hush now. I’ll take care of you.”

 

His fingers finally tangled into Douglas’ hair, pulling slightly when knots interrupted the gentle strokes.

Martin started talking about how proud he was that Douglas came to him. Thanking him. Telling him he is there, taking care of him.

 

Douglas felt his body relax at the words, the tension draining out of him as the blissful quiet starts creeping into his mind until there were only two things left on his mind. Martin’s hand in his hair and the low rumble of his voice washing over him.

 

Douglas was dimly aware of being moved.

The hand anchoring him never leaving for more than a second, Never left long enough for him to resurface again. The moving stopped, another point of warmth appearing at his cheek, the warm feeling surrounding him more.

 

Douglas fully lost track of time, his mind finally at peace.

 


	4. aftercare and aftermath?

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> This chapter is brought to you by dream!Bryn. Who didn't beta it (yes it's unbeta'd :P) but inspired me to get up early and write half of this.

Martin had been surprised how easily Douglas was dommed, he wasn’t arrogant enough, to his own prowess though. After looking for the signs he had seen how high-strung Douglas had been.   
He had been taught that subs sometimes worked themselves into a state only a Dom could get them out of but he had never witnessed it first hand before. Despite all that Martin had thought it would require more than just words to properly Dom Douglas.

Part of him wanted to reprimand Douglas for waiting this long before getting someone to help, but the rational part of his brain reminded him that it wasn’t his place. A moment later it also occurred to him that he had known Douglas was a sub two days ago. 

It became clear to Martin that Douglas was well and truly under already when he told him to move closer to the sofa so Martin could sit down. His head followed Martin’s hand when he tried to remove it to let Douglas move.   
Martin sighed internally.   
He didn’t know how long Douglas would be under and if he would be able to stand still for that time, so he started slowly moving Douglas. Turning him to face the sofa, urging him to move forward a bit. Martin made sure that one of his hands always stayed on Douglas, keeping up the string of reassurances, not fully sure which of the two had been the thing to put Douglas under or if it had been the combination of both. 

When Douglas had finally been moved into a position that would let Martin be more comfortable he let himself fall onto the sofa bracketing his legs around Douglas. He guided Douglas’ head to lean against his knee, resuming the strokes through Douglas’ hair. 

Martin relaxed against the sofa as much as he could while keeping up the strokes, closing his eyes to rest a bit. Not even daring to look at the time, knowing it could almost be considered early instead of late. 

 

_____________________

 

Douglas was woken up by something bright shining into his face, at first he was disoriented as to where he was.  
He tried guessing where he was without opening his eyes, the brightness almost hurting already.

He was leaning against something warm but he seemed to have fallen asleep on the floor.   
His knees and back would remind him of that for a while. 

There was also something resting on his shoulder. 

He groaned when the memories of the night before came flooding back into his mind. 

“Oh god! I fell asleep. Sorry! Come up here!” his groan seemed to have woken Martin, who was back to his normal self.   
“It rather seems I have fallen asleep on you. You don't have to stay if you have things to do”  
“Of course I have to stay. Up on the sofa with you!”  
“I'm not sick or anything! I don’t need to lie around on the sofa”  
“No but I let you fall asleep sitting on the floor! How could I? You lie down in a proper position and rest your back and legs a bit. I'll make breakfast”  
“I slept very well. I don’t need more rest.”  
“Can you stand up then?” Martin challenged.

Douglas tried his best only to find that his legs had fallen asleep from however long he had been sitting on them.   
“See!” Martin stood up from the sofa stretching in the movement before heaving Douglas onto the sofa. He positioned Douglas’ legs so they were stretched out on the sofa rearranging all the pillows he could find so Douglas could lean against them.   
“You really don’t need to fuss about me this much.”  
“But I want to, so stay there! Any wishes on what I should make?”  
“You can cook? And also how are you going to make something? You don’t know where anything is”  
“I can find out and of course I can cook. I can’t turn carp into a gourmet meal, like you, but I can definitely make breakfast and a few more things.”  
“If you insist” Douglas resigned “Make whatever you feel like and can find the ingredients for…”

Douglas’ legs were starting to tingle, but it would be some time before he would be able to properly walk again.   
Somehow it felt nice to just sit there listening to Martin moving around in his kitchen.   
How terribly domestic.   
Douglas stopped himself from imagining being treated like this more often. The chances of that happening were pretty slim.

 

_________________

 

Martin came back into the living room carrying a tray filled with various choices of breakfast food. When he saw the way Douglas had relaxed against the pillows he wanted to stroke through his hair again and tell Douglas what a good sub he was, but he knew it wasn’t his place.   
Douglas had barely allowed him this, he didn’t want to risk getting thrown out before he had made sure that Douglas was fine.  
There may have been no toys involved to make Douglas submit, but Martin still had to be a hundred percent sure Douglas was fine before he could leave him alone again.

Martin shook himself out of his musings as he placed the tray down on the coffee table, handing Douglas the cup of tea that Martin had made for him.

“Thank you. Isn’t that a bit too much for just two people?”  
“It’s not that much. I didn’t know what you wanted, so I made a bit of everything” Martin shrugged. He knew he may have gone a bit over board but there were some things he didn’t have full control over. “I’m sorry I can pay for what I used”  
“Don’t worry about that. Most of it will keep and spare me the bother of making lunch later” Douglas said, amused that Martin was fussing over him like the Doms in chick-flicks trying to woo the sub. He took a sip of his tea to hide his amusement “Oh this is really good!”  
“What do you want of the food?”  
“Just a bit of the eggs and bacon”

Martin handed Douglas what he had asked for and suppressed the urge to feed Douglas. Instead he grabbed another plate from the tray and sat down on the floor besides Douglas to eat. Douglas gave him a look at that but said nothing. 

______________

As their meal came to an end Douglas started to wonder when Martin would reprimand him for what he did, start the name calling at his needy request, or talk about the fact that Martin had gotten nothing from their deal yet. He waited for Martin to demand something in return for the time he had wasted by being here.   
Douglas was confused by Martin’s continued fussing.   
It was sweet but unusual. He didn’t dare bringing any of it up in fear of scattering the happy bubble they were in. 

 

Martin’s phone sounded in his pocket and he looked at it “Oh damn”  
“What happened?”  
“I almost forgot, I have a job in less than 2 hours. How are your legs? Will you be alright? I can still cancel!”  
“Martin. I’m fine. My legs are back to normal and I’ll just take it easy today. Go to your job”  
“Okay okay. If anything comes up, though, call me”  
“Of course”  
“I’ll just put all this away and then I’ll be on my way”  
“Leave it. I can do the dishes myself and it’ll be nice to have food right here. You go and do your job.”

It took a little more persuasion to get Martin out of the house but after he finally left Douglas wondered if Martin knew what he had been doing or if that had been pure instinct.   
Even if it just had been on instinct, did Martin know how strong they had to be to manifest in this way? 

Martin may have been joking that he was a bad Dom but Douglas had known many Doms in his life and it was pretty rare that a Dom’s instinct for aftercare extended to more than checking for injuries and maybe getting him something to drink.

 

So Douglas spend the rest of his day off lazing around, not managing to get Martin out of his mind for long.

Maybe there would be a chance to talk about all this on tomorrow’s flight. If Martin didn’t have any other subs maybe he could help Douglas on a more regular basis.   
Not only would it help Douglas, Douglas would also get a chance to satisfy his curiosity about the strength of Martin. 

 

________________

 

When Martin was back in his room getting ready for work he started to realise what he had just done.   
He would have to apologise to Douglas tomorrow about being so overbearing. 

Why did this always happen to him? That was why he didn’t often go on dates and never one night stands. It would just end with him being politely kicked out afterwards because he always got so damn annoying. 

He should have better self-control than that.

 

________________

 

To say the next morning at work was hectic was an understatement.   
Carolyn had send Martin to change the flight plan twice, all preceded by Martin arguing about the illegality of what Carolyn wanted him to do.  
Douglas didn’t fully listen to what was happening he would get the briefing eventually, it wasn’t like he had any other plans that Carolyn could get in the way of this time. Instead he tried thinking of a good way to ask Martin about him becoming Douglas’ semi permanent Dom. 

It turned out that Carolyn had booked them on an extra trio again, they would fly the cargo they had come to fly today, then, instead of going home after one night, fly some client from there and back. And home only after that, which added almost 2 days to their trip.  
Douglas had learnt the hard way that it was always best to pack more than what the trip asked for when flying GERTI. This wasn’t the first time Carolyn had planed a detour only after they arrived for work after all. 

After a rushed take-off caused by the time the arguments and changes had taken, their flight promised to be a nice one. Not too long and the weather was good. 

 

“About yesterday…” Douglas started.   
“I’m so sorry Douglas. I was so overbearing”  
“No need to apologise, you weren’t overbearing”  
“I was! I pressured you into breakfast and resting.”  
“It’s really fine Martin. It’s natural, nothing to be ashamed of”  
“Is it really? Tell that to every other person I Dommed”  
“You may have gone to greater lengths than most Doms but it’s definitely natural. I should be the one apologising about calling you so late at night”  
“It was” Martin tried thinking of the right word “nice”  
“I did hope you weren’t too angry with me about that, because I wanted to ask you something” Douglas steeled himself to say what could equally lead to a good or a bad outcome, and for oncr he had no idea which outcome would happen “Martin, would you…”  
“Not here Douglas” Martin interrupted him “We can talk at the hotel but I’m not discussing this at work”

It hadn’t been an outright ‘No’ so Douglas gained hope for the good outcome.

“Ok here’s one: Actors that could have done a better job”

The flight after that went by without any incidents and Douglas was once again surprised when Martin didn’t forcefully take the landing off him despite it being a relatively hard one. Sure he argued but he had stayed as professional as ever. 

________________

 

Their hotel was of the same quality as they always were, but Carolyn had granted them both their own room this time.   
She and Arthur had gone to their respective rooms already and before Martin could vanish too Douglas stopped him “Can we talk later?”  
“Yes of course” Martin said, remembering that Douglas had attempted to talk to him in the flight-deck “I promised after all. I just need to hang my uniform and then…” Martin trailed off, not knowing what he should offer as a meeting point.  
“Can I come by your room with dinner later?”  
“Yes, yes of course” Martin said before leaving Douglas’ side to go to his room.

_________________

 

When Douglas got to his own room, he quickly changed into something more comfortable and ventured out to find something to eat for Martin and him.   
It didn’t take him too long to find some acceptable take-out place and while waiting for the food to be ready Douglas started to doubt his plan to get Martin to Dom him more often.   
But there wasn’t really a way out of it now, was there?

Back at the hotel Douglas went straight to Martin’s room and knocked on the door. Martin opened the door in only a worn T-Shirt and what looked like pyjama pants. His hair curly and still slightly damp.   
Douglas managed to stop himself from starting, before Martin would notice. 

“I hope you like Thai” Douglas said as Martin let him into the room “It’s the only thing I could find around here”  
“Yeah sure. Um… There is no table so we’ll have to sit on the bed… If that isn’t a problem. I can sit on the floor if you want me to” Martin rambled on clearly uncertain where this was going and wanting Douglas to be comfortable.   
“We can both sit on the bed.”

It took a bit of rearranging but soon enough they were both sitting on the bed facing each other and eating their food.   
Martin was still tense around Douglas and Douglas was getting more nervous the closer it got to the end of the meal. 

It would be the moment of truth if Douglas could get Martin to agree to his stupid plan or if he would be once again left alone. Stranded as an old, single sub who couldn’t keep a Dom interested.


End file.
